MURDER AS A FANATICISM

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162

THE ADVOCATE OF PEACE.

November, 1869.

military talents " ! Thank God for the Alexanders, and
Genghis-Khan, and Attilas, and Napoleons, those rav-
agers of continents, and wholesale butchers of mankind '
As well thank God for the devil and his allies in sin and
mischief. — Military talents in heaven ! Saints and angels
going to fight there, and turn it into a battle-field, a cen-
tral Aceldama for the universe ? Where will the revolting
absurdities of war-logic end ?

MUEDEB AS A FANATICISM.

There is said to be in Russia a seot who believe in assas-
sination as a religious duty or merit, an offering agreeable
to God. They have committed so many murders that the
government has been forced in defence of society to take
measures for their suppression.

This, strange delusion is by no means new. On the con-
quest of India the British found there a religious sect whose
peculiar mission or vocation was to commit murder. They
secured their livelihood by assassination. It was a matter
of both religion and business. One of the sacred Hindoo
books is devoted to the sect, and with minute accuracy des-
cribes their creed and their practice. We can hardly creo>
it or conceive the existence of such a sect ; but the main
facts are well authenticated. It is said that they murdered
not from malice, nor for the sake of plunder, but from re-
ligious motives. A religion of blood ; men killed without
malice, solely to please the great Father of all !

We know only one match to this strange and horrid de-
lusion — the custom of war. Is not the war-system, now
kept up in every Christian land, a fair and pretty full coun-
terpart to this thuggism? There are millions of men in
Christendom, supported at an expense of hundreds and
thousands of millions of money, whose profession and whole
business it is to kill men, not on their own account or plea-
sure, but at the arbitrary bidding of their rulers. ' They
protest, like Hindoo thugs, that they commit the crimes of
war, its wholesale robberies and murders, from no malice or
.selfish motives, but as a matter of duty in obedience to their
rulers ! They say they have no responsibility in the case
they just do the deeds of violence, blood and vengeance
which they are commanded to do.

Such is the Thuggism of War. And is it not akin to the
bloody, remorseless fanaticism of Russia and Hjndoostan ?
What valid warrant can there be for either system in Chris-
tianity, reason or common sense? Yet this system of
blood, inherited from pagan barbarism, is still continued
under our religion of peace, with little disposition anywhere
to call in question either its necessity or its propriety I

' m+^-- ■

Loose Logic. — "When the Cubans are sufficiently consol-
idated to be recognized as an armed force, representing or-
ganized military and civil power, and holding possession of
a province, or some leading city, then the force of public
opinion in the United States will demand recognition."

So says a Boston journal that claims a very wide circula-
tion and great influence. But in such talk is there any
principle, reason or common sense ? The Cuban rebels are
trampling under foot all the laws of the government over

them, wholesale violators of law ; and can it be right for
our government, or any other, to abet or in any way aid
them in committing suoh crimes ?

We know well the excuse — they are revolutionists.
True ; but can this plea alter the question of right, or
prove that they are not committing such crimes? Does
any government permit or excuse such crimes ? Can it and
live? It is conceded on all hands that such deeds of vio-
lence and blood as the Cuban rebels are now perpetrating,
would be inexcusably wrong unless they have " an armed
force, and possession of a province or some leading city."
What a criterion of right ! Can ability to commit crime
with success or impunity, make such crimes right and
praiseworthy? If a large number of men raise an army,
get possession of one or more considerable cities, and thus
acquire power to commit robbery, murder and all manner of
crimes on a gigantic scale, should we think all this Would
make- it right for our government, ^or any other, to recog-
nize them as rightful belligerents and an independent na-
tion ? True, England and France conceded belligerency to
our rebels ; but did we think then, or do we now, that they
were right ? Did not England burn her own fingers by so
doing? May not we burn ours by meddling with the Cu-
ban imbroglio ? Alas! how little conscience, consistency or
common sense in the intercourse of nations.

Bishop Wilberjorce on War. — "I can hardly con-
ceive," he says, in a recent sermon before a Missionary
Society, " a more miserable circumstance for the whole
civilized world, and for the whole Christian Church, than
that through the evil passions of men these two great coun-
tries (England and the United States) should be driven
into war. We ought to be at peace ; our interests are one ;
we are both the great witnesses for liberty ; we are both the
great witnesses for national freedom. If we should be
diverted from advancing these blessings throughout the
world by a mutual hostility one to the other, it would bo
one of those deep judgments of which we read in the
blackest pages of past history as having been allowed to
overshadow humanity; and yet we see how one single
utterance of one man, whose temper is not under perfect
control, has been permitted to electrify a great continent
and endanger the peaceful relations of two mighty empires."

Peace Sentiment in France -r-It is only germinating
there among the people after ages of an intense war-mania.
" It is incontestably true," as Frederic Passey says, " that
the influence of our ideas has increased considerably within
some months. Within a week even, on the occasion of the
election" of our representatives, one could see, without
exaggeration, that the cry, down with war, had considerable
influence. Every one of the candidates declared energeti-
cally in favor of Peace, the reduction of the army, and the
diminution of the Budget of War. This is'the best proof
of the popularity of these ideas. .We have not the pre-
sumpticn to attribute the honor of this change to our efforts
entirely ; but we should do injustice to ourselves, and the
friends, of the cause, if we did not say that our efforts had
contributed towards this end. This result was not so much
from the real sentiments of the candidates as it was the
progress of public opinion."